Category: Celebrations of Life

“Long as You’re Living: A Sermon in Three Songs and Some Words”

Reverend Janna Nelson was ordained by the First Existentialist Congregation of Atlanta in 1999, where she was an active member for decades before moving to Albuquerque, New Mexico, to be closer to her large family. She is a retired elementary school teacher and preschool director who enjoys children and who learns as much from them as they do from her. She misses the daily opportunities to address various biases and provide more accurate historical perspectives for children, to build empathy and critical thinking as they try to understand their place in this complex world. She was singing with a sister in classrooms in a local school until the pandemic closed schools down in March.

Since moving to Albuquerque, she has finally had the time and opportunity to explore her voice more fully as a teacher, as well as mess around on the piano more. This time and work have given her the confidence to start teaching a little piano and voice, meeting people where they are.

She is honored to be speaking to the congregation and is grateful to be invited to share reflections through an existential/feminist perspective, going back to source material. She had personal experiences as a young person that stirred ideas about life that she later found expressed by these writers and thinkers. These ideas and concepts continue to be a touchstone for a way to live life more fully, with all its complexity and grief and uncertainty, to participate in freedom from oppression and alienation of all kinds, a way to keep moving forward, to help build something good, to participate in healing. A way to still live in the moment, to find lightness, to cultivate curiosity, to let in beauty, to grow and expand, to connect with others, even while living in these times.

“Our Right to Dreams of Justice”

Rev. Duncan Teague (former longtime member of the First E Cong) dreamed and planted the Abundant Love Unitarian Universalist (UU) Congregation in the West End community of SW Atlanta. Abundant LUUv, soon 3 years old, February 2021, is committed to the work of healing communities. The congregation is working, for example, with Emory’s Rollins School of Public Health and the School of Nursing to assist with research to inform faith-based HIV/AIDS prevention programs from the perspective of Black gay and bi-sexual men. Rev. Teague has served a term on the UU Ministers’ Association’s Committee on Anti-Racism, Anti-Oppression, and Multiculturalism (CARAOM) and the Appointments Committee of the UUA Board of Trustees. Rev. Teague resides in Decatur, GA with his husband, David Thurman, a retired researcher, celebrating 27 years together.

“Re-imagine: Being and Flow”

Dr. Jean Heinrich is a moving human being, musician, licensed clinical psychologist, long-standing member of the First Existentialist Congregation, and sometimes Trickster. She is presenting, in word and song, “Re-imagine: Being And Flow” and inviting you to experience creating in one’s mind in a new, refreshed way.

“Voting as Spiritual Practice”

Franklin Abbott has been a practicing psychotherapist in Atlanta for nearly forty years. He is also a poet, musician, community organizer and amateur oral historian. His connection to the Congregation and Old Stone Church goes back more than forty years to early urban radical faery gatherings held in the sanctuary before First E became its steward. He has spoken at First E many times, performed music and poetry there, coordinated events and memorials. He and First E founding minister Lanier Clance were friends and co-hosted an eclectic close existential radio program on WRFG for over five years in the mid-‘80’s.

“On Resolve and Determination”

These remain tumultuous times; likely, more tumultuous than we have ever experienced. As hard as we have tried and after all we have been through, we find our circumstances worse than when COVID first appeared. Much worse. We are in lockdown with thousands dying daily. Hope is on the horizon but we still face a global crisis and, as a nation, one might argue we have failed to curb the tide of suffering and loss. How do we muster the courage to proceed especially when we may be of an age where we have less resilience, less energy and fortitude? Together, we can explore teachings and practices that can support our resolve to carry on. First and foremost, we must be determined to not cause more harm. We start with ourselves. What can we do to ease the suffering in our own lives? This allows us to take yet another giant step forward and resolve to cultivate the skillful means to help end the suffering in the lives of others. The good news is we are not alone. Being in spiritual community is refuge. Together, we will know the benefit of our resolve.

John Mifsud was born on the Island of Malta and identifies as Arab-American. He has practiced Insight Meditation since 2001 and graduated from the Community Dharma Leaders Training Program at Spirit Rock Meditation Center where he is currently on the Board of Directors. John has extensive retreat experience and practiced throughout Asia. He is the Guiding Teacher of the Malta Insight Meditation Society and a former Community Teacher at the East Bay Meditation Center (EBMC). He is the founding leader of EBMC’s Deep Refuge Sangha for Alphabet Brothers of Color. He teaches internationally with a special interest in delivering mindfulness tools to marginalized communities.

“Words Matter”

A look at words of the year for 2020 – our own ones – looking back, looking forward – and the official ones from the major dictionaries. Words have always mattered to Rev. Marti Keller – as a journalist, cultural critic, social justice advocate, and minister.

Rev. Keller, a self-described Jewnitarian, has just completed a month of intensive study during Elul, the time of personal preparation for the Jewish high holy days. She co-edited “Jewish Voices in Unitarian Universalism,” is past president and present board member of Unitarian Universalists for Jewish Awareness, and past member of the executive committee of the Society for Humanistic Judaism.

In June, the Unitarian Universalist Women’s Federation honored Rev. Keller with the Ministry to Women Award for activist-minister.

“Moving Forward”

Rev. Kimble Sorrells is an ordained minister in the United Church of Christ, with a ministry in contemplative practices focused on equipping us with the peace and resolve to be justice makers in the world. They are also a Registered Yoga Teacher and draw on this and other spiritual traditions to inform their ministry. As a Bi-vocational minister, Kimble also works with Lifeline Animal Project as the Community Programs Manager, guiding caseworkers as they assist pet owners in times of challenge.

Kimble has experience in variety of ministry setting. They have worked in LGBTQ advocacy for many years including as staff for Reconciling Ministries Network and the Atlanta Pride Committee. They currently serve on the Mayor’s LGBTQ Advisory Board and work primarily in advocacy with the Transgender community.

“Life as a Research Chaplain: Science & Heart ”

What does a Spiritual Health Researcher research? And how does it relate to matters of the spirit? Come hear about a research program investigating chaplaincy and compassion, and how the findings are implemented to bring comfort to the afflicted.

Patricia (Kim) Palmer serves the Emory University Woodruff Health Sciences Center as the Manager of Research Projects in Spiritual Health. She is a board certified chaplain with over five years of clinical experience and earned an M.S.P.H. in Epidemiology from Emory University as a Transforming Chaplaincy Research Fellow. She is ordained in the Unitarian Universalist tradition and serves as an affiliated community minister for a congregation in Roswell, Georgia. She is currently engaged in a multi-year, multi-study research effort to investigate the effect of Cognitively-Based Compassion Training (CBCT) on chaplains and the effect of CBCT-adapted interventions on patient and provider outcomes, and she is exploring the possibility of a part-time return to clinical work as a chaplain.

“Getting Ready: a meditation on the coming year”

A founding member of Alternate ROOTS, a service organization for community-based artists in the South, deNobriga served as ROOTS’ executive director and planning/development director for ten years. She continues to serve on the working on various committees as needed, and sharing the institutional memory of 40 years of continuous membership.

Raised in Kingsport TN, deNobriga holds an M.A. in Theatre (Directing) from Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, NC, and a B.A. with honors in Speech Communications and Theatre Arts. Her early employment included directing and managing community theatres in Smithfield and Sanford, NC and performing with The Road Company, a professional ensemble in Johnson City, TN. DeNobriga was a Visiting Artist for two years for the NC Arts Council, and a Fellow in the Rockefeller Foundation’s Next Generation Leadership program and in the Rockwood Leadership Institute.

She is now a consultant, specializing in strategic planning, building organizational capacity, designing staff/board retreats and guiding creative conflict engagement. She is project manager for the Arts and Democracy, and a member of the consultant pool at the Georgia Center for Non-Profits. She trained as a mediator at the Atlanta Justice Center and is a board member for Arts & Democracy and Alternate ROOTS. She served two terms as Councilmember and one as Mayor for the City of Pine Lake, where she is an advocate for and practitioner of arts and community development.

“Nothing is Written – Where Do We Go From Here?”

2020 is a year that will be vividly remembered by most eve of the world. Here in the US we have faced an uncontrolled pandemic and uncontrolled president. How do we move forward to recover physically, mentally, economically, and emotionally? How do we heal? How will you?

Our Fellowship Minister, Rev. Marsha Mitchiner, has served the Congregation for over two decades, since ordination by us, following her study with Rev. Lanier Clance. She counsels, connects, and contacts members and friends, and for those who need it, performs the laying-on of hands in her role as a massage therapist. Many of us can vouch for the quality of her work, and appreciate the wisdom, restraint, and compassion she brings to the job of caring for our Congregation. Marsha speaks once each quarter, and helps smooth the functioning of the Congregation innumerable times in between.